Page 1822 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 18 October 1989
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The question of consultation is one that the Rally has to face up to because we are a party born out of that ethos. I think that adequate recognitions have been made in other places as to the misfortune that befell the Rally in this exercise, in that really we fell prey to our own keenness to have our enunciated policy - a long-established policy that was enunciated officially on 31 January 1989 and was the subject of a press release thereafter - put into effect, pursuant to the mandate we believed we had received. But we underestimated the reaction of the community. When I say "reaction of the community" I am very warmed to note, as probably other members of the Assembly are, that the community, in fact, has not walked away from this Assembly - half the community, or perhaps even more; the silent majority may well support this - the problems being in the process rather than in the substance of this Bill.
I specifically want to put on record refutation of the claims in the national press that some fly-by-night group of knee-jerk decision makers came to a sudden decision. We all knew in this Assembly that fluoride was on the agenda, it was going to come on sooner or later, and we knew from 23 August up until 27 September when the act was done that the Bill was on the floor. So we all bear some responsibility for that - but not to shake that responsibility.
A very strong reason why the Assembly tends, in the cut and thrust of debate, to move Bills very quickly into law is that we do not have second reading speeches. We do not get the chance to reconsider which our colleagues on the other hill get - they do not get the advantage of public reaction - and, of course, we have paid the penalty. The Rally particularly has paid the penalty in that regard, but we are not going to resile from our position on the substantive issue. We do not support this Bill simply because we are convinced that freedom of choice is the ultimate ethic in this issue and two breaches should not compound the problem.
During the fuss afterwards the Chief Minister issued a press release deploring the criticism of the legislative draftsman by the opposition parties. I want to put on record that I was present with the draftsman and my colleagues Mr Kaine, Mr Duby and Mr Prowse, when both Mr Kaine and I made it clear to the draftsman that we accepted that he had carried out to the letter, as we understood it, the instructions of the mover of the Bill, Mr Prowse. At no time did I ever criticise the parliamentary draftsman and I have no recollection of hearing Mr Kaine or any member of his party make any similar criticism. I think that that press release by the Minister was a fairly cheap shot at us when we were already suffering on that issue.
On the subject of cheap shots, I think that we have got to recognise that the Labor Party had our policies during the negotiating stage early in May and their lack of a policy
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